The life of Roman Polanski is one as tormented as what he puts on screen. It's commendable, even intelligent to view Macbeth as echoing the trauma he suffered in 1969. How are we supposed to interpret the excessive gore, imagery of children, or the murder of a wife? But it seems completely arbitrary to associate The Ghost Writer with the recent rabble of attention lathered upon him lately. Polanski is at once a pedophile and husband to a slain wife—perennially remembered as the former. His reputation precedes his talent (perhaps it should); it's a reputation that goes for the throat, but it's undeniable that talent still resides. Even when dealing with potentially chalky, trite material, we are in experienced hands right from the moment we sense something is amiss, which is about a minute-and-a-half into the movie might I add.

Roman Polanski seems most comfortable when working in enclosed spaces. This may be his European filmmaking instinct that finds solace in compartmentalized zones. His nominal "apartment trilogy," Knife in the Water, The Pianist, suspense works well when the protagonist is weighed down, and it works even better when they have nowhere to go. This is pretty much where Ewan McGregor finds himself, marooned on an Eastern Seaboard island, slaving away to pen an autobiography. As a Ghost, he has no family—how clever. As a writer, well, he's pretty damn good. He's so good in fact that he can commission a book in a month, even when he knows nothing about politics and hasn't read his predecessor's original manuscript, who wound up dead because of it. What's crafty about the story telling is that McGregor has no interest in politics, even when the autobiography is centered on a former, disgraced British Prime Minister (Pierce Brosnan). Things need to be explained to him, hence being explained to us, and the ultimate truth beneath the bevy of politicians and esteemed figures isn't that sordid at all, and believe you me, they all have their respective places in this roman à clef. Is that supposed to be Condoleezza Rice on the T.V.? Oh, hello Tony Blair. And then there’s Olivia Williams, hunkered down as the sagacious but surly wife, who’s pissed because her husband’s (Brosnan) affair is an open book, and vixen Kim Cattrall unsurprisingly plays the mistress.

Polanski is a master of quietude, and this is a quite movie. We are not thrust into scenes or excitement. On the contrary, we are allowed to observe a situation, to get a feel for it and have our barometers attuned. The camera-work is fluid and steady. There is a scene with Eli Wallach, best known as Tuco from The Good, The Bad and the Ugly, and who is as old as movies themselves. His scene is pretty pivotal. It's where you would expect the plot to thicken, and it does in a way but not to lead the movie down a new path. This is more foreboding, where characters learn things by inference rather than signals, which gives the recognition more credibility. The Ghost Writer is pure Polanski moviemaking—slow, delicate and deliberate. Not since All the President’s Men have I seen such intriguing conversations take place over the phone, (okay, that may be overkill), but the use of modern technology is used graciously, building suspense rather than breaking it.

Some of the tactics didn’t work for me, however—the bass clarinet score (or oboe, my ear isn’t that tuned) reminded me of my middle school days, and there were some dubbed-in words. (PG-13 can’t swear too much.) But these are minor imperfections and shouldn’t be used to deride the movie. I’m actually surprised that there haven’t been scores of angry mobs picketing outside theaters. It’s worth noting that The Ghost Writer was made prior to Polanski’s arrest, edited after. If you already knew about his situation, will you see it? What was the point of this review then?